Poison and Wine
by starry19
Summary: 5x02 Tag "His fingers tapped each other impatiently once more, and she knew suddenly what he was fighting against. She had been right, then, to not touch him. He was the one that got to dictate those terms. And he had managed to talk himself into not reaching for her." Conversations, apologies, and courageous actions. Jane/Lisbon, of course.


**A/N**: I wasn't going to write a tag for 5x02...but I appear to have anyway. Overall, I think I loved the episode, but like 5x01, I just felt like something was missing. C'mon, Bruno, just humor the shippers a little bit.

The title comes from the song by the Civil Wars. It's very Jane and Lisbon. Check it out.

**Disclaimer**: They're not mine, but I promise to return them in almost the same shape I found them in. Possibly a smidge rumpled, but in generally good condition.

**Poison and Wine**

She had gone up to Jane's attic hideaway before she left, ostensibly to check on him. In all honesty, she should have insisted that he go back to the hospital. But in typical Jane fashion, he had managed to talk her out of her legitimate worries and convince her to go along with his plans.

It should have been a quick visit. She would have asked how he was, he would lie to her, she would pretend to believe him, they would share a joke or some commiseration, and then she would go home, slightly worried about him, just like always.

Instead, she was standing outside the heavy door, one hand poised as if to knock. She had no idea how long she had been there. Long enough that her legs had started to remind her that humans didn't innately stand for this long without moving.

She took a deep breath, ready to call out for Jane, but the sound died before reaching her throat. Her eyelids fluttered shut, and she chided herself before indulging in another silent prayer. _Please, God, give me courage. _

It wasn't the first time she had prayed for such a virtue, not by a long shot. Usually it was in the context of waiting for the signal to charge into a den of murderers, guns blazing. It was human instinct to want to run, fleeing, from such a scene, but she was a state agent. She couldn't afford to have such weaknesses.

She prayed for patience frequently, as well. Dealing with a combination of Patrick Jane and lying suspects day in and day out could wear on her nerves, and she had to remind herself that snapping would do no one any good.

Her prayers weren't all selfish, either. Often, she pleaded for the safety of her team in general, and Jane in particular. As in, _please, God, don't let anyone shoot him at the crime scene today. _She had asked God to protect him in an entirely different manner when he disappeared. Some of those petitions, shamefully, had ended with her begging God to send Jane back to them. Back to her.

And, lo and behold, he _had_ come back to her. In a church, no less. She supposed that was proof that _someone_, at least, was listening.

Tonight, her supplications were of a different manner entirely. She wasn't attempting to do anything that was likely to cause her physical injury, her team was in no danger, and Jane was twenty feet away, close enough to touch if she could just bring herself to open that damn door.

She needed courage because she was terrified. More than anything else, she was afraid to find Jane talking to his dead daughter.

There wasn't anything in her life so far that had prepared her for what had happened today.

Personally, she saw nothing wrong with talking to the dead. She did it all the time - to her mother, mainly, but occasionally she directed a few comments towards Sam Bosco. Jane talked to his wife every now and then, she had learned, and there was something painfully heartbreaking about that, considering he swore he didn't believe in ghosts or any sort of afterlife.

But Jane hadn't been talking to spirits earlier. He was quite literally having a conversation with Charlotte. When he had dropped that particular bombshell, she had felt her heart jump into her throat.

Jane was a rational person. He knew his daughter was dead. He knew that the Charlotte he was seeing was a figment of his hallucinating mind.

Lisbon held onto that knowledge, using it to comfort herself as the case unfolded. She wondered if he was cracking up, finally, for real this time.

"_Teresa, you can call me Patrick." _

She hadn't, of course. In all the years they had worked together, she had never called by his first name, beyond introducing him or chiding him exasperatedly. _This is Patrick Jane _or _Patrick Jane, were you trying to help me?_

And he didn't call her Teresa, except when he was about to shoot her. Or when he lost his memory.

Even after his weird, abrupt statement, he hadn't called her Teresa. So what the hell was that even about?

She took another deep, bracing breath. _Just open the goddamn door_, she told herself sternly. _Stop trying to sort through this. _

"Jane?" she called suddenly, surprising herself. Her voice was a shade too loud to be totally normal.

"Come on in," came his almost immediate response.

She paused for one more second to ask for courage again, and then pushed the door aside.

He was sitting with his back to her, staring fixedly out the grimy window at the glimmering lights of Sacramento. The ubiquitous robin's egg blue cup provided the only splash of color in the picture, standing out against the background of browns, grays, and blacks.

Just like he had taught her, she took in all the details she could see, committing them to memory. _Look for the inconsistencies, _he had reminded her.

Nothing jumped out at first. There was just Jane, sitting with a cup of tea, understandably lost in thought. She felt relieved that his gaze was far away, not trained on something only he could see. And then the hairs on the back of her neck stood up.

Surely he wouldn't...surely he had more sense than that? She struggled to maintain her calm demeanor.

"Out of tea bags?" she asked, hoping her voice sounded normal.

"Relax," he said, waving a hand negligently at the brown paper bag. "It's been one of the most bizarre days I've had, and that's saying a lot. I decided to splurge on some good stuff."

She didn't say a word, busy dissecting every nuance in his tone, looking for indications that he was lying to her. Of course, this was Jane, and no one could lie like he did.

"If you don't believe me," he said, correctly interpreting her silence, "pour yourself a cup."

So she did, hands trembling slightly, which she was sure he noticed. Carefully, she moved the electric tea pot out her way and perched on the edge of his desk, facing the door.

Jane held her eyes as she took her first sip. The tea was almost bitter, the exotic flavor surprising, given Jane's usual taste.

She calmed slightly, fairly certain that whatever else had happened, Jane wasn't willing to let her poison herself just to avoid having his bluff called.

"Feel better?" he asked, taking a sip from his own cup.

"Marginally," she replied.

"Please, Lisbon, some trust." He took on a pained expression. "I'm not that desperate to talk to Charlotte again that I'd kill myself off to do it."

She shrugged. "Sorry," she said. "You haven't exactly been yourself."

He snorted. "No kidding?"

They were quiet for a moment, both quietly thinking, though very different thoughts. Eventually, she peered down at him. "Are you doing okay?"

His lips quirked in a wry, sarcastic smile. "In what way? I had my stomach pumped, which is a delightful procedure, tripped out enough to make The Beatles jealous, and spent the day talking to my dead daughter."

She rolled her eyes. "I know it was a stupid question. But I had to ask it anyway."

His expression softened. "I know you did," he said. For the first time, he turned towards her fully, their legs almost touching. "Do you know what part I'm having the most trouble with?"

"Um, maybe that you confused some garden gnomes with actual people?"

He gave a brief chuckle. "Well, there's that, I suppose." He paused, sobering. "But it's what Charlotte said that's bothering me."

She could feel her brows furrow. "Jane..." she began, but he cut her off.

"I know, I know, she didn't actually say anything," he said quickly. "It was all in my head. But humor me here." He took a breath. "She wanted to know why I spent my time hunting down Red John."

Despite her trepidations, she went along with him. "You'd think she would already know the answer to that."

He nodded. "That's what I told her. And then she said that she and Angela didn't give a damn what happened to him."

In the back of her mind, she noted the use of his wife's given name. In ten years, she had never heard him say it, not even once. However, there were more pressing matters at the moment.

"And you find it troubling that your mind is apparently second-guessing your life's work?" she asked, but gently.

He stared at her, eyes suddenly over-bright. "My mind," he said, very softly. He put his tea cup down, then laced his fingers together, resting his chin on them. "You're absolutely right," he told her, sounding almost embarrassed. "I've been wondering why _Charlotte_ said it...but it was never her, was it?"

"No," she murmured, shaking her head.

He swore quietly, closing his eyes.

She waited for him to work through it, setting her tea cup down. Maybe she should have kept it; her hands wanted something to do, and they were currently clamoring to touch Jane. To take his hands, or to brush his hair from his forehead. Anything to establish some sort of connection, to offer any kind of comfort she could.

But the established rule was that unless it was a light, inconsequential poke, he touched her first. She rarely knew what was in Jane's mind, and she wasn't going to reach for him when he could realistically want the exact opposite. She wasn't going to be a burden that way.

Instead, she studied the lines of his face. They were deeper than she remembered, but still very dear. The past year hadn't been kind to him. His loose living in Vegas, and the stress he had been under since, had taken its toll, as had the constant insomnia. His temples were throbbing with the force of his thoughts.

She could guess what was going on. The imaginary Charlotte had told him many things, some of which he didn't particularly want to hear, relating to how he was conducting his life. And now he was forced to confront the fact that it wasn't Charlotte at all, but his own self.

Until this point, Jane had probably never doubted the course he was on and why he was on it.

Maybe it was a good thing. Revenge was something that controlled you, that ate into the corners of your soul, turning you into something you had never been. She had tried to steer Jane from that twisted road, but he certainly hadn't taken her words to heart.

But hearing his daughter questioning his motives, and then realizing that _his own mind_ wanted to know why...

He sighed and opened his eyes. She couldn't begin to guess at the conclusions he had drawn. "Do you think my treacherous subconscious was right?" he asked, voice casual. But she heard the weight behind his words.

"I think that no matter what happens, you can't bring them back," she replied, almost in a whisper.

"I know that," he said, but he didn't sound angry. Just thoughtful. "I just don't think it ever crossed my mind that maybe they wouldn't want me to...do this."

"Really?" she asked, not bothering to hide her surprise.

His expression invited her to explain.

She took a breath. "Jane, I know I never met them, but they loved you. They certainly wouldn't want you to devote your entire existence to hunting down a serial killer."

"But why not?" he asked, sounding genuinely uncertain. "It's for them; everything is for them, after all."

She sighed. Even Patrick Jane couldn't escape the constraints of a male mind. "What if the scenario was reversed? Imagine your wife leading the same life you do. You don't have a social life, you have no hobbies. Hell, you don't even have a real place to call home. What would you think if Angela was sleeping on a mattress under a smiley face drawn in your blood?" She hadn't meant to go in that direction, but once the words started, she couldn't stop them.

When she had said his wife's name, she had gotten a visible reaction. There was a moment when he sifted through her words, tried to do as she asked and imagine the shifted situation.

"I'm sorry," she added, quietly. She hadn't set out to hurt him. Really, though, with those sorts of mental pictures, what else did she think she was going to do? She had no idea what Jane was envisioning in his head at the moment; she was sure it was nothing good at all. With a start, she realized she couldn't begin to see what Jane was. She wasn't even sure what Angela looked like. "That was over the line," she added.

He brushed her apology away with a shake of his head. "Do you really think so?" he finally asked. "What you said earlier...do you honestly believe that?"

With a smile smile, she nodded. "I can't speak for them, obviously, but it's how I would feel."

Jane held her eyes. She wondered if he was looking for truth. Well, she was certainly telling it.

He let out a silent breath eventually, reaching for his tea cup. After raising it to his lips, he made a face. "Lukewarm is not a temperature that works well with this particular brew," he noted.

At his words, she relaxed out of the tense posture she hadn't even known she was in. The conversation was getting too heavy. She had no desire to try to put herself in Angela Jane's mind again. It was too bizarre, too unbearably intimate, trying to think of Jane as her husband, as someone she had promised to love until death.

Whether or not she herself would love him until she died was another story entirely.

"I'm not sure this variety is going on my list of favorites," she said, carrying on the tea conversation.

Theatrically, he sighed. "And here I thought I was making so much progress with you, grasshopper. I was starting to hope that one day I'd catch you drinking tea without me having to force it on you."

"Sure, Jane, that'll happen," she retorted. Never ever, even under pain of death, would she admit to him that she had bought some of his favorite blend and had taken to having a cup at the end of long days. Only in the privacy of her apartment, however. With the blinds shut. She also fought the urge to burn the incriminating evidence of the used tea bags. Irrational, but Jane would never let her live it down if she was found out.

She stretched her legs out once before standing. The wooden desk wasn't exactly plush, and, like Jane said, it had been a very long, bizarre day.

"It's time for me to head out," she said, reaching for her used teacup.

"Leave it," Jane told her. "I'll take care of it later." He stood as well, shedding his coat.

She turned towards the door. Almost immediately, she felt his hand on her back. It was a reassuring gesture, one she had come to expect. And one she missed dearly when he was gone.

Jane had no aspirations to be some sort of bulletproof, machismo hero, but from time to time, he let her know that he was right behind her. Granted, occasionally he was several feet behind her, but the idea was the same. She was the protector in their relationship; she was the one with the firepower.

But the guiding hand on her back, that was his way telling her that he would catch her if she fell. It was a refreshing change, to know that someone was watching out for her. And she knew that he was. Yes, he cared about the team, but when they were threatened, when something bad happened, he always found her first.

Whatever she felt about Jane, and their non-relationship, those were the moments she held onto. When she knew that she was at the center of his thoughts, if only for that instant. More and more, however, she was beginning to suspect that Jane always kept one eye on her. It was comforting, but also worrisome. There were some things that he didn't need to see, some emotions that she would much rather keep to herself.

Having reached the other end of the room, Jane hauled the door open for her. She turned to face him.

"Try to get some rest tonight," she said. "You look a little frazzled."

He actually laughed. "I imagine that I do. I_ feel _slightly more than a _little_ frazzled, for that matter."

She smiled. "You're probably entitled to that."

"Goodnight, Teresa," he said, smiling back. "And thank you."

"What for?" she asked, frowning now, the warmth that had flared in her chest at the use of her given name fading out.

"For telling me the truth. And for making me see it." He looked a little sad again, and like he was fighting with himself about something. She saw his fingers twitch.

"You're welcome," she said. "I'll see you in the morning."

His fingers tapped each other impatiently once more, and she knew suddenly what he was fighting against. She had been right, then, to not touch him. He was the one that got to dictate those terms. And he had managed to talk himself into not reaching for her.

It was disappointing, but at least she knew that part of him wanted to.

"Drive safe and all that," he said, watching her walk out the door.

She smiled out of nowhere. "Goodnight, Patrick," she said impulsively.

Her prayer for courage had apparently been answered, because she didn't look back to see his reaction.

She could only hope that some of her other, more intimate prayers, would be answered. Prayers that she didn't even dare whisper aloud.

Her eyes closed briefly as she begged with everything she had.

_Please._


End file.
